


In every gesture, dignity and love

by cormorans



Category: Cormoran Strike Series - Robert Galbraith
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-09-16
Updated: 2017-09-16
Packaged: 2018-12-30 13:42:36
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 549
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12109962
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/cormorans/pseuds/cormorans
Summary: A headcanon weaved into a drabble dedicated to my friend Renée.





	In every gesture, dignity and love

**Author's Note:**

> A headcanon weaved into a drabble dedicated to my friend Renée.

HABITS HAD ingrained themselves into their now entwined lives. Tacitly, agreements had been reached, occurrences had morphed into patterns, a routine had been set into place. Strike, therefore, found himself dialling for a cab and giving him Robin’s address instead of his own. It was late. Early, rather. Over the rooftops, he watched the sky shed its dark coat tainted by the city lights to allow the sun to cast its own upon it in various shades of orange and yellow. London was waking up. A yawn escaped him and he fought sleep, the throbbing pain in his knee the sole and unique shield warding off slumbers.  
As cautious as he was, as silent as he tried to be, his cumbersome walk rendered all the more stiff and clumsy after a night chasing shadows across the city elicited a stir from the shape curled up under the covers. Even now, habits prevailed: his coat was discarded in neat fold on the back of the only comfortable chair in her room, his shoes pushed under it. That was all he managed to achieve before reaching for the bed. Under his weight, the mattress bowed and the base creaked. Strike bit back an expletive, exhaled loudly through his nose and closed his eyes. He should take off his prosthetic. Perhaps swallow a couple of painkillers. Or he could rest for a few minutes then tend to it and attempt to relieve the pain.  
On the other side, Robin stirred. He mumbled something, his mind already drifting, lost to the haze of that blissful state between sleep and consciousness; and whatever he’d said earned him a soft chuckle and a kiss. Did he smile then? His head rolled on the pillow, eyes still closed, body sinking into the warmth and the scent of the woman beside him. She moved. He could feel her move. Blindly, a hand reached out for her, caressed its way down the sheet until it found fabric then flesh. Robin moved again, spoke, sat up. The sheets were pulled off. That was greeted with a grunt of protest she ignored. When she worked on his trousers to gingerly slid them down, Strike rolled, lifted the lower part of his body and opened his eyes. They blinked in their struggle under the sharp light of the morning sun.  
“Don’t bother,” he mumbled, closing his eyes again and burrowing his face into her pillow. There, he took in a breath, filled his lungs with her scent. A stupid lopsided smile pulled at his lips. “Robin…”  
“Shush.”  
That she was used to doing this, to working her fingers on the mechanism holding the prosthetic to his knee, to knowing how to take it off without causing him any pain or discomfort was enough to stir something within him. For want of holding her nestled against him, his arm wrapped about the pillow. The leg was taken off, discarded with a small thud at the foot of the bed she then abandoned. He thought of protesting, of calling her back to it. Perhaps he did. Already, Strike was slipping in and out of sleep, aware of her presence and attuned to it without it impeding on his falling asleep.  
When she left, the kiss she pressed on his cheek didn’t wake him.


End file.
